By Andrew
It’s late September and you’ve just stepped off the airplane. A few hours ago you were hugging your folks goodbye in Chengdu, your auntie crying like a baby and even your uncle dabbing his hankie at his eyes pretending he had a cold. But that happened in another country, another continent, another age. Now you’re walking into the arrival area of the airport hoping your passport, visa and all the other bureaucratic details that will allow you to study in your new country are in perfect order. They are, and you breeze through immigration with no trouble.
If you’re lucky someone will collect you and take you to your new home. If not, it’s a bus or taxi – you’re pleased your English is easily good enough to get around. You get to your apartment, then phone or skype Chengdu. Maybe a little sob – gosh, I’m homesick already. If you’re well organised, you’ll unpack your suitcases, put your things away and place your books on the shelves.
Now what?
Get out of your room. Go for a walk. Discover a little about the area. Pop into a cafe. Buy a magazine or newspaper. Buy some things to brighten up your apartment. Eat at the student snack bar or restaurant and, when you do, make sure you don’t sit at a table alone. The really brave may even knock on another new student’s door and ask if they fancy going for a coffee together. The important thing is – get out!
After a day or two the university will give orientation to new students; some call this ‘Freshers’ Week’. This is a really important time, absolutely vital. You will be given the chance to sign up for clubs and societies. Make sure you do sign up for one. Or two. Or three. Or four. Or more. There will be something that interests you. And the essential point is that people join a club because they are attracted to it, not because of where they come from. Joining a club will enable you to meet people who like doing the same things you do.
Something else you are going to do is silently thank all those nagging teachers in Chengdu who made you speak English to other Chinese kids. So, when there are three new Chinese students and one from Canada in your group, you speak English. And it’s automatic, you don’t even need to think about it. If you can’t do that, learn to before you leave our Centre. This is an essential skill, and it will be too late to learn it once you ’ve left here.
Maybe in your first week, people will ask you to go out and do things with them. You have three choices:
1.I can’t make it today because I want to ensure I read ahead for the first physics lecture – you say this because you’re a great student and really mean it.
2.I can’t make it today because I want to ensure I read ahead for the first physics lecture – you say this because you’re shy.
3.Thanks, I’d love to come.
There’s only one good choice hereout of the three; understanding the universe can wait for a couple of hours, making friends can’t.
Whether you are very outgoing and confident or shy and timid, you can make friends with foreign people and, don’t forget, we are all foreign to others. Be Chinese, yet be at home as an international student. How do you do this?
1.You make an effort to do it.
2.You remember you may be shy, but so are other people. There will be students so glad you want to make friends with them. Look around: not everyone is loud and attracting attention to themselves.
3.You never, ever speak in Chinese if there are non-Chinese speakers within a kilometre of you. If a Chinese person speaks to you, reply in English, whatever language they use.
4.You join a club.
Your main reason for going to university is to study. But studying hard is not enough. You must also learn skills that will enable you to be a person comfortable with language and cultures that are not your own. This will give you a chance of getting a better job and also to live a life that is both much more fulfilling and fun than it would otherwise have been.
Don’t be a fish that only knows its own pond. There’s so much more than that. Enjoy the sea, land, sky and space as well.
(图片来自网络)
